Rounding up March with bookish recommendations
We are three months into 2021 and it’s time to take stock of things in life. COVID-19 is still here, Europe is going back into sporadic lockdowns and we are still asking–WHEN WILL THIS END?
But it’s not all gloom and doom. On the personal front, with a new job where I sometimes get paid to write (yay!), a kid back in school and my first shot of COVID vaccine around the corner, I would say things are looking up.
However, it is a long road till things truly get back to normal (and who knows what that will mean…
In a slightly terrified kind of way
It’s that season of the year. Snowy evenings, foggy mornings, and early sunsets. Shadows on the streets.
The quiet in the house with the radiator buzzing in the background. The quiet outside as everyone stays in avoiding the cold. The quiet everywhere.
Winter is the time for ghosts to come calling. I know Halloween month is for spooky stories, but where is the fear in silly costumes and golden autumn light. No, it is the ominous grey cloudy wintry days that set the perfect stage for us to crawl into the pages of ghost stories.
So here we go —…
From new releases to books as old as time, this was an eclectic reading year.
End of the year is a time for cheer and celebrations; it’s also time to catalog another year of our life. What you achieved (staying alive and not catching COVID), places you travelled to (nowhere, because COVID), things you ate (loads of home-cooked meals, because COVID) and books read (so many, coz what else were you gonna to do because COVID!!)
So here are my obligatory ten-books-of-the-year list that literally nobody asked for. It was hard to whittle it down to ten from the 54 books I read (as per goodreads.com), …
I just loved this. Last year has been hard and with just the craziness of routine..I find very little time to celebrate the now. And this is such a great guide on sort of slowing down and building habits, that will let me get back the things that made me happy.
A look at Matsuo Basho’s collection of haiku poems in ‘The Narrow Road To The Deep North and Other Travel Sketches’
Read Matsuo Basho
Create your own poetry.
On this day of Spring!
It’s April 17th, when we celebrate International Haiku Day worldwide because this form of ancient Japanese poetry is that awesome. If you are nerdy about poetry, then I expect your social feeds to be full of haiku memes, forwards, and jokes. On this day, haiku gets a lot of love in the world.
So, What’s A Haiku?
For those who are not familiar, haiku is a traditional form of Japanese poetry. A haiku poem follows a three-line with five-seven-five syllable structure. …
A review of the two movies that wrapped up the Harry Potter movie franchise.
The Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows movies had a lot to live up to when it came to fan expectations. For the book readers, who had been on the journey much longer than the movie fans, it was the final closing chapter of the Harry Potter series. At that point in 2011, no one knew that Rowling would have an equally hard time letting go of the characters and would end up writing a Broadway show.
The Harry Potter movie series had been an uneven…
I am definitely putting this on my reading list!
Such a wonderful review and welcome to the 'suffering-from-Daevabad-withdrawals' club ....if you don't feel it yet, you may soon. Chakraborty is busy writing a pirate trilogy that I am looking forward and I think a selection of 'deleted/extra scenes' from Daevabad is coming out next.
‘The Turn of the Screw’ still giving the chills over a hundred years later.
If there was ever an award for a book that builds fear just by its atmospheric set up, then Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw would be a strong contender.
Old Country house manor -check. Angelic, golden-haired, creepy children- check. Conspiring servants — check. Floating shadows — check. Unhinged potentially misunderstood heroine–check.
The Turn of the Screw fulfills all the horror tropes; in fact, I wonder if this is where tropes come from. So what makes this novella such a classic?
(Note–This review is full of spoilers but if a book is over 100 years old, does it even…
Award-winning movie is a coming-of-age film, political satire and feminist tale all rolled into one
Once upon a time there was a girl in Iran and Persepolis is her story.
Based on the autobiography of Marjane Satrapi, this quirky animated movie is about the coming of age of young Iranian girl amidst the volatile political climate of the country in 70s and 80s.
In 1979, at the start of the Iranian revolution, Marjane was living with her parents in in Tehran. Her grandfather was in prison for being a communist and unsupportive of the Shah regime. Her family supported the underground movement to overthrow the Shah’s rule.
As the Islamic revolution takes place, and Ayatollah…
Vipula Gupta
California based culture blogger, obsessive & compulsive reader, globetrotter. Day job in technology. Writes at https://shadesofwords.com/!
